Fidelity FDIS ETF: Consumer Discretionary Dashboard For June (NYSEARCA:FDIS)

This monthly article series shows a dashboard with aggregate subsector metrics in Consumer Discretionary. It is also a top-down analysis of sector ETFs like the Consumer Discretionary Select Sector SPDR ETF (XLY) and the Fidelity MSCI Consumer Discretionary Index ETF (NYSEARCA:FDIS), whose largest holdings are used to calculate these metrics.

Shortcut

The next few paragraphs in italic describe the dashboard methodology. They are necessary for new readers to understand the metrics. If you are used to this series or if you are short of time, you can skip them and go to the charts.

Base Metrics

I calculate the median value of five fundamental ratios for each subsector: Earnings Yield (“EY”), Sales Yield (“SY”), Free Cash Flow Yield (“FY”), Return on Equity (“ROE”), Gross Margin (“GM”). The reference universe includes large companies in the U.S. stock market. The five base metrics are calculated on trailing 12 months. For all of them, higher is better. EY, SY and FY are medians of the inverse of Price/Earnings, Price/Sales and Price/Free Cash Flow. They are better for statistical studies than price-to-something ratios, which are unusable or non-available when the “something” is close to zero or negative (for example, companies with negative earnings). I also look at two momentum metrics for each group: the median monthly return (RetM) and the median annual return (RetY).

I prefer medians to averages because a median splits a set in a good half and a bad half. A capital-weighted average is skewed by extreme values and the largest companies. My metrics are designed for stock-picking rather than index investing.

Value and Quality Scores

I calculate historical baselines for all metrics. They are noted respectively EYh, SYh, FYh, ROEh, GMh, and they are calculated as the averages on a look-back period of 11 years. For example, the value of EYh for retailing in the table below is the 11-year average of the median Earnings Yield in retail companies.

The Value Score (“VS”) is defined as the average difference in % between the three valuation ratios (EY, SY, FY) and their baselines (EYh, SYh, FYh). The same way, the Quality Score (“QS”) is the average difference between the two quality ratios (ROE, GM) and their baselines (ROEh, GMh).

The scores are in percentage points. VS may be interpreted as the percentage of undervaluation or overvaluation relative to the baseline (positive is good, negative is bad). This interpretation must be taken with caution: the baseline is an arbitrary reference, not a supposed fair value. The formula assumes that the three valuation metrics are of equal importance. A floor of -100 is set for VS and QS when the calculation goes below this value. It may happen when metrics in a subsector are very bad.

Current data

The next table shows the metrics and scores as of last week’s closing. Columns stand for all the data named and defined above.

	VS	QS	EY	SY	FY	ROE	GM	EYh	SYh	FYh	ROEh	GMh	RetM	RetY
Auto + Components	-28.13	4.55	0.0678	1.1882	0.0117	16.48	27.30	0.0604	1.6393	0.0379	19.35	22.04	-9.88%	-26.71%
Durables + Apparel	75.39	26.43	0.0930	0.8697	0.0700	29.51	42.21	0.0505	0.6979	0.0322	18.02	47.36	-7.84%	-25.50%
Retailing	-10.06	12.66	0.0551	0.7295	0.0313	31.68	34.69	0.0499	0.8948	0.0402	24.35	36.41	-5.58%	-14.54%
Services	-16.94	-14.21	0.0193	0.3212	0.0249	11.39	33.26	0.0345	0.4148	0.0215	14.50	35.75	-6.22%	-20.49%

Value and Quality chart

The next chart plots the Value and Quality Scores by subsector (higher is better).

Evolution since last month

The value score has improved in all subsectors except retailing. Quality has deteriorated in auto and components.

Momentum

The next chart plots momentum data.

Interpretation

Durables and apparel is the most attractive industry in consumer cyclicals. It is significantly undervalued relative to 11-year averages, and quality is above the baseline. It includes household equipment, leisure products, textile, apparel and luxury goods. Retailing is overvalued by 10% relative to the baseline, and quality is close to the historical average. Auto and components are overvalued by about 28%, and quality is close to the baseline. The services subsector, which includes hotels, restaurants, leisure and diversified services, has improved a lot since the end of pandemic-related lockdowns. It is now moderately below the baseline in both value and quality.

FDIS fast facts

The Fidelity MSCI Consumer Discretionary Index ETF has been tracking the MSCI USA IMI Consumer Discretionary 25/50 Index since 10/21/2013. It has a total expense ratio of 0.08%, which is lower than XLY (0.12%).

The fund has 324 holdings as of writing. The next table shows the top 10 names with basic ratios and dividend yields. Their aggregate weight is 57.8%, with 33.3% in the top two companies. Amazon and Tesla represent 19.47% and 13.83% of the fund’s asset value.

Ticker	Name	Weight	EPS growth %TTM	P/E TTM	P/E fwd	Yield%
AMZN	Amazon.com Inc	19.47%	-21.09	51.23	142.39	0
TSLA	Tesla Inc	13.83%	637.63	88.24	54.47	0
HD	Home Depot Inc.	6.84%	14.89	17.19	16.38	2.81
MCD	McDonald’s Corp	4.10%	37.63	24.76	23.92	2.36
NKE	NIKE Inc	3.30%	78.66	28.36	29.09	1.14
LOW	Lowe’s Cos Inc	2.87%	33.57	14.05	12.73	2.44
BKNG	Booking Holdings Inc	2.02%	-27.70	154.22	18.36	0
SBUX	Starbucks Corp	2.02%	347.38	19.24	24.83	2.73
TGT	Target Corp	1.70%	-1.53	11.55	15.54	3.10
TJX	TJX Companies Inc	1.69%	122.72	20.52	17.68	2.08

Ratios: Portfolio123

FDIS has beaten XLY by a short margin of 63 bps in annualized return since inception. It is a bit more volatile and, as a consequence, has a slightly lower Sharpe ratio (risk-adjusted performance).

	Total Return	Annual. Return	Drawdown	Sharpe	Volatility
FDIS	151.50%	11.26%	-36.96%	0.69	18.60%
XLY	139.44%	10.63%	-35.84%	0.71	17.48%

Data calculated with Portfolio123

In summary, FDIS is a good product with cheap management fees for investors seeking capital-weighted exposure in consumer cyclicals. It holds 300+ stocks including large, mid- and small caps, whereas XLY has only 61 holdings in large companies. It has outperformed XLY by a short margin since 2013. FDIS looks a good choice for long-term investors, but XLY liquidity makes it a better instrument for tactical allocation and trading. Investors who are concerned by the weights of Amazon and Tesla may prefer the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Consumer Discretionary ETF (RCD).

Dashboard List

I use the first table to calculate value and quality scores. It may also be used in a stock-picking process to check how companies stand among their peers. For example, the EY column tells us that a retail company with an Earnings Yield above 0.0551 (or price/earnings below 18.15) is in the better half of the industry regarding this metric. A Dashboard List is sent every month to Quantitative Risk & Value subscribers with the most profitable companies standing in the better half among their peers regarding the three valuation metrics at the same time. The list below was sent to subscribers several weeks ago based on data available at this time.

BLMN	Bloomin’ Brands Inc
GDEN	Golden Entertainment Inc
PLAY	Dave & Buster’s Entertainment Inc
PLCE	Children’s Place Inc
AN	AutoNation Inc
ABG	Asbury Automotive Group Inc
WSM	Williams-Sonoma Inc
JWN	Nordstrom Inc.
M	Macy’s Inc
SBH	Sally Beauty Holdings Inc

It is a rotating list with a statistical bias toward excess returns on the long term, not the result of an analysis of each stock.